Genesis: Reborn
by OokamiManiakku
Summary: Someone as insignificant and weak as me couldn't possibly be good enough for anything. I'm no better than the dirt on the ground. So... why does He continue to believe in me? Why do I keep on living?" This is a story of my OC. Updated: 1/19/09
1. Chapter 1

**Spoilers:** BR

**Rating:** T

**Warnings:** Violence, gore

**Notes:** I decided to re-write Genesis. I've got a different perspective on A.J.'s life now. It's not as cartoony and much more... erm... dramatic, I guess.

Genesis: Reborn

**Noun: genesis (geneses)**

**1.** a coming into being

**2.** the first book of the Old Testament: tells of creation; Adam and Eve; the Fall of Man; Cain and Abel; Noah and the flood; God's covenant with Abraham; Abraham and Isaac; Jacob and Esau; Joseph and his brothers

**Chapter One**

_The waves were a dark, deep blue color. I leaned over the grassy edge to get a better look. The white foam at the tops of the waves crashed onto the rocky shore in methodical, gentle pulses around the big, black boulders wet with fresh water and covered in moss. The rocks were stationed randomly along the shore of the lake._

_My eyes focused upward, to the ominous, black clouds that lingered low overhead, threatening to pour out buckets of rain at any moment. The wind kicked up around me, whisping my feathery, black hair around my face as I stood there._

_I closed my eyes and breathed in the sweet smell of the small sea below me. It was a good day to die._

_It was as if Mother Nature knew what events were to take place today and had prepared this funeral- the only funeral I would ever get- of nature for me. I appreciated the effort, but I was not deserving of it. There should be no funeral for a monster. Funerals were for loved ones, for friends. I was not loved. I had not been loved for seven years._

_I smiled to myself. Surely this would work. The shore was several yards beneath me and if I aimed my jump correctly, I might just be lucky enough to bash my skull against a boulder or crack my spine on one of them. There was no way I could bounce back from this like I had all the other times. I was sure of it._

_Feeling a bit self-concious, I pulled my sleeves back down over my bandaged wrists and flexed my fingers. I was prepared to die. I needed to die. The world would be better without me._

_With these thoughts in mind, I leapt from the cliff, diving toward the biggest rock I could reach._

_I felt the searing pain almost immediately. Never had I felt so much physical pain in my life and although I screamed out in agony, I welcomed the torture. My vision blurred, but I knew that I had cracked my head on the boulder as I had wanted. A warm, crimson liquid trickled from my head wound into my eyes. I tried reaching up to knock the irritating liquid away, but my arms wouldn't move. Had I hit my spine too? I couldn't recall. There was a blankness between the time my feet left the ground to the moment my broken body lay on the sand below, staining it red. Was I going to die?_

_A thrill of hope surged through me. I attempted to wiggle my toes, just to make sure, but found that I was not able to. Perhaps, then, I had actually accomplished something to better the world._

_I felt my lips curl upward as my vision faded to black._

"Damn it, Ashley." The man hissed as he flew through the air. The wind whistled through his jet black hair shaped into devil's horns. His usual angry, crimson eyes were scanning the ground below worriedly. He stopped, mid-air, and hovered just above the cliff, his eyes focusing on the broken figure below.

"Ah, hell." He spat as he dove toward the ground. He landed next to the body as two rings of black energy expanded from his middle and stretched outwardly toward his feet and head. His black hair became white and pulled into a ponytail lying on his back. His red eyes became a grayish-blue color, rimmed with purple shadows that made him look bruised in the eyes. His skin turned from the ghostly blue color to a porcelain white shade and his white, caped suit changed into his usual evening outfit of a black suit jacket, slacks and a white shirt.

The man sighed as he eyed the girl on the ground. Her black hair was tousled out, soaked in crimson blood that pooled around her broken body. Her snow-white skin was stained with the color, along with her clothes and shoes. Her eyes were closed, but he'd seen them enough in the last month to know how bold a green they were.

Vlad Masters pursed his lips at the girl, furrowing his eyebrows. He bent down next to her cold, motionless body. He reached out with a pale hand and pressed two fingers to her throat. A soft, slow beat pulsed under his fingers.

Vlad smiled. "Good. I wasn't done with you yet." He shifted his hands beneath her body and lifted her into his arms. Her head fell backward. "Anubis is good for one thing, at least," he whispered as the rings of energy burst from his middle again and transformed himself into his alter ego, Vlad Plasmius. The ghost took to the air, flying back toward his mansion.

As he sped through sky, the girl twitched in his arms. He glanced down to see her eyelids open ajar. Her glassy eyes focused on him. "Welcome back to the living, Darling." Vlad chuckled, the low rumble in his chest vibrating against the girl's body. Her eyes closed again and she sighed as she fell back into unconsciousness.

_As if life weren't mocking me enough._

_The thought drifted slowly into my mind as I gently came back to consciousness and realized with great disappointment that I was still alive. My plan hadn't worked after all. I mentally winced at the pain that came with the sudden clarity of my mind. My body hadn't fully healed itself yet... and with the amount of damage I had sustained... it was likely going to take a very long time before I was well enough to complete my work._

_The thought made me smile. At least, if I couldn't stop myself permanently, I could stop myself temporarily. I needed at least a week before every bone in my body would fuse back in place, before every severed nerve would sew itself back together, before every gash in my skin and muscle would seal itself up completely. A week of no working. A week of no Anubis._

_Anubis didn't bother visiting me when I was not useful to him, which often gave me a bit of peace of mind. But when I was finally repaired, like a favorite toy that had been lost, he would come back in full force and torture me again._

_My eyelids twitched. I wanted to open my eyes so badly, to see where I was, but my eyelids were too heavy. I tried moving my fingers. They twitched, but just barely. I could feel something around me that I didn't understand. It felt like liquid. Why would liquid be surrounding my body? Had I drifted further into the lake? If so... why didn't I feel like I was drowning? Why were my nose and mouth dry?_

_Instinctively, I tried to open my eyes, to understand this strange circumstance. My eyelids barely opened a pinch. After blinking a few slow times, I cleared the blurriness enough to realize that I was surrounded by liquid. But not lake liquid. The water around my body had an eerie, green tint to it. My eyebrows furrowed as I tried to comprehend what was going on. I looked down to see a plastic covering over my nose and mouth, feeding me oxygen._

_At once, I realized what was going on. I hadn't died. I had been saved._

Vlad Masters leaned back in his chair, holding the mug of hot liquid in his hands. He stared into the fireplace, where orange flames crackled and licked up around the starter log. The fireplace was set deeply into a mahogany wall lined with classy portraits, house plants and busts of himself. A bear rug laid out beneath the chair, the brown bear's mouth open to the flames. Vlad sighed as he sipped at the tea in his hands.

"Cupcake," a feminine voice called behind him. Vlad smiled at the nickname and turned in his chair to see the holographic woman stride up to him. She was a petite woman with chin-length brown hair and lavender-colored eyes. She smiled sweetly at him before her image fuzzed out for a fraction of a second.

"Yes, Maddie?" Vlad replied, sipping at his tea again.

"The subject is awake, Dearest." The hologram giggled and shrugged her shoulders sweetly as she stood there.

Vlad practically leapt to his feet. "She is?" The grin planted on his face was not one of loving relief, but rather mischief or amusement. He hurried to his fireplace and set the mug down on top. Then, quickly and precisely, Vlad turned the head of his bust to the left and pressed down on it. There was a clicking sound behind the wall before the fireplace began to rumble. Vlad took his mug again and stood back. The flame in the fireplace blew out as the hearth moved backward and then to the side, revealing a secret passage behind it. He smiled as he sauntered down the steel steps in the concrete hallway to the room below. As he made it into the laboratory, Maddie appeared in front of him.

"Vitals are stable, Vladdykins." She giggled.

Vlad gave the hologram a strange look at the new nickname before continuing to the giant supercomputer in the center of the lab. Statistics came up on-screen for him when he walked up. Vlad smiled and sipped his tea.

"Thought you could escape, Child?" He called out. His voice echoed through the room, but there was no response to his question. Rather than continuing with his banter, Vlad just laughed once without humor and took another drink. "How bad was the damage?" He asked the Maddie Program.

The hologram disappeared and reappeared next to him. "Extensive, Sweety. She will not be functional for at least three more days."

Vlad narrowed his cold eyes on the images flashing onto his computer. "Little brat..." He murmured. He about-faced and strode across the lab to the opposite side where three large, cylindrical containers stood. Two were locked securely with steel surrounding them, but the third pod was brightly lit with green liquid. Vlad stepped up to that pod and began typing on the small control panel in front of it.

The bright green lights slowly dimmed down until a figure was revealed in the liquid. A broken figure. One with no clothes but plenty of bandages to cover her body. Her black hair floated up, away from her pale, fragile-looking face. An oxygen mask strapped around her sunken cheekbones to the back of her head, pumping oxygen into her nose and mouth. The girl's eyes were barely open a slit. Vlad gave her a once-over, noting the twitching in her fingers and toes, before he took another sip of his tea nonchalantly.

"Is this what you wanted?" He asked quietly. "To be broken? To be in so much pain? Is this what you desire, Ashley?"

The girl didn't respond and if it weren't for the random twitching of her limbs, she looked dead.

Vlad sighed, set his mug down, and pinched the bridge of his nose out of stress. "I have tried to be good to you, Daughter. But you continue to refuse my hospitality." He looked back at her. "You have broken the last straw, Ashley."

Her eyebrows furrowed a touch.

"I am fed up with trying to teach you. I have given my time and resources to you and you still refuse. I don't know how it's possible, especially with Anubis helping me along."

At the mention of "Anubis", Ashley's eyebrows raised and her eyes opened a touch wider.

"Perhaps he has a better approach to these things." Vlad grinned. "Perhaps I should take his example." The man took his mug up again and turned away. "You will do as I say, Girl. You will." He promised as he slowly sauntered away.


	2. Chapter 2

**Spoilers:** BR

**Rating:** T

**Warnings:** Religious content, very mild gore

**Notes:** I love Vlad. 8D Yay Vladdykins!!!!

**Chapter Two**

_The room was dark. Even the outside light was filtering in through the one window in a foggy, gray kind of way. Probably because of the storm outside. I could hear the rain hitting the roof of the building now, even though the roof towered above where I lay. Closing my eyes and allowing my hearing to reach further, I could make out the sounds of electricity jumping from cloud to cloud as it built up, getting ready to discharge into the earth. The gentle rumble of thunder echoed each arc in electricity._

_The storm brought a smile to my face. I always felt calmer when it was raining, though I had no idea why. I smiled to myself. Even now, as I lay on the twin-sized bed in the small room, aching with pain, I could smile. Because I knew that I had won... in some form at least._

_No, I hadn't won the war. But I wondered if I ever would be able to. So, instead of focusing on the grand scheme of things, I often looked at each day as a battle. One step further toward my goal. I knew that I had won this battle, won this small victory. At least I could be happy with myself for now._

_I opened my eyes again, slowly. The gray, concrete walls surrounding me wouldn't usually be able to keep me here on a regular day. I could plow through the cinderblocks like they were paper most of the time. But the state I was in prevented me from moving beyond sitting up or lying back down. I was in so much pain._

_Normally, I would have refused medical attention. Perhaps, if I were in my right mind, I would have torn off the bandages and braces already. But I was tired. My head hurt and my eyes wanted to close desperately. I wouldn't let them. I wouldn't allow myself to sleep._

_The rain hardly ever came anymore and I wanted to enjoy it while it lasted._

_Gingerly, I lifted my head from the pillow... and cringed. Blood pounded in my ears to the beat of the throbbing in my head, but I pressed on. I managed to pull myself into an upright position, gasping and whimpering in pain when I finally made it up._

_Carefully, I swung my legs over the side of the bed and let the balls of my feet touch the cold cement floor. It felt good- the cold. My body was naturally hotter than a human's, and now that it was desperately trying to fix itself, my temperature was no doubt rising as if I had a fever throughout my entire body. In all reality, the floor could have been a balmy seventy degrees and it still would have seemed like sub-zero temperatures to me._

_I straightened my back, hearing as well as feeling the crackles and pops of my vertebrae becoming aligned again. I felt something seeping at the back of my head, so I reached up to feel my dressings. Sure enough, my hand came away with blood smeared on my palm. I sighed. Eventually my immune system would take care of it._

_I smiled. How many more days would that add until I was functional again?_

He breathed in deeply and let it out slowly. He needed to keep himself calm. Yes, she was a hassle, but she was worth it. All of that strength, those powers... at his disposal. He just needed to keep her for a little longer. Just enough time to get rid of the pesky thorn in his side.

Vlad sighed and turned the key in the lock. He opened the door and paused. "What are you doing out of bed?" He asked gently.

The bandaged figure in the room just stood with her back to him, facing the only small window. She didn't say anything.

Vlad walked into the room and closed the door behind him. "You should not be standing, Ashley. You need-"

"A.J." She corrected in a whisper.

Vlad rolled his eyes. "Whatever. You need to be resting, Dear. Letting your body do its work."

"My body will fix itself whether I'm sitting or standing." The girl replied. "It doesn't matter."

"That's not the point."

"I don't care what the point is." A.J. swiveled her upper body around so that she could look at him. "Go away."

He knew that she didn't just mean for him to leave the room, but to actually go away. Far away and leave her alone. "I'm not leaving." Vlad said darkly, allowing her to interpret his own meaning. She turned away from him again.

"Then kill me now." She sighed.

"You know I won't do that."

"Can't." She corrected.

"True enough. I can't kill you." He admitted, taking a few steps toward her.

"So you keep me here to torture." She whispered back. "Just like Anubis."

Vlad's eyebrows furrowed. "I am nothing like Anubis." He hissed. "Don't you dare compare me to him."

"Why? You're both arrogant, selfish, evil, self-righteous, oh... and let's not forget lunatics." She sneered her reply.

"You are trying my patience." Vlad hissed the warning.

A.J. simply sighed and moved back to her bed. "Just leave me alone, Masters."

"Excuse me?" Vlad asked, arching an eyebrow.

Her emerald eyes burned intensely as she spat through clenched teeth, "_Father._"

He smiled back. "Much better. Now, get some rest." He turned to leave.

"So I'll be ready for tomorrow's torture." She replied, lying back down on the bed.

Vlad stopped in his tracks and lowered his shoulders. "I'm not torturing you, Ashley." He whispered. "I'm teaching you."

"Teaching me how to be a more formidable enemy so that I can kill others more easily." She added.

"No, teaching you to control your powers so that you don't look like a freak when your tail accidentally pops out in the middle of a grocery store." Vlad hissed back. "Teaching you how to become a civilized human."

"I am civilized." A.J. growled back, sitting up again.

"But not human."

"You can't _teach_ me to be human, okay?!" She shrieked. "I'll never, _ever _be human! I'll never fit in so if that's really your main goal in life, you can just give up!" Her eyes became glassy as she stared at him. He stared back.

He eventually closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and sighed. "I am doing everything in my power to-"

"Ruin what's left of my pathetic existence." A.J. interrupted, finishing his sentence. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. "If you really wanted to help me, then you'd figure out some way of killing my mind...."

Vlad raised his eyebrows. "What?"

"I don't care what Anubis does with this body. I just don't want to have to face it. If I could just get rid of my consciousness... or fall into a coma... then I'd never know. And Anubis could have his precious toy all to himself, no restraints, no fighting."

"You wouldn't rather win your body back?" Vlad asked quietly. "You really just want to give up?"

"What's the point? I'm never going to win anyway...." She mumbled.

Vlad chuckled darkly, causing A.J. to look at him out of curiosity. "You have much to learn, Little One. Much to learn indeed." He casually strode out the door, locking it behind him and leaving A.J. to wonder about his last statement.

_Stupid, arrogant, annoying ghost...._

_But I had to admit, Vlad had done some pretty amazing things for me in the past. Including rescuing me when I had gotten myself into certain situations. He really had taken on the role of a parent, but with parents come rules. Vlad's were strict and restricting. I was never allowed to go anywhere outside his property without him. I was not allowed to watch television or listen to the news. I couldn't visit anyone (not that I had anyone to visit) and I had to train. A lot._

_There were some benefits though. Like the house. His mansion was absolutely huge. Covered in tacky, football gear mind you, but huge. And there were always plenty of new places to explore. He would go hunting with me on a regular basis so I was not as sickly-looking as I had been before. He often read me stories or told me of his own adventures._

_But still... that was not enough. And somehow, I could see beyond the parental mask he always showed me. He had ulterior motives. I knew this for one because he was down in his lab a lot more than usual lately and I was not allowed to be down there. I also knew this because when I had tried to leave him one time, he had practically hunted me down like I was some sort of precious game that was getting away from the hunter. He was using me... for something._

_I did appreciate him more than I let on though. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I was still looking to fit in, looking for someone who accepted me. And Vlad was the only person that knew me fully and completely accepted me too. He was so comfortable with me, in fact, that he had begun calling me his "daughter". _

_I did have to admit that I liked him way more than Anubis, even though I often compared the two. At least Vlad had a heart. It may have been a cold one, but it was still beating._

_Anubis had no heart. No soul. No good inside of him. Well, what did you expect from a fallen angel? People often say that even the worst of villains have a little good inside of them._

_Not Anubis._

_Anubis was the closest thing to the devil that I had ever encountered. Of course, he wasn't the devil because the devil was actually calling the shots with Anubis...._

_No, Anubis was more like a henchman. An evil, very powerful, very controlling henchman that liked to shred your brain on a cheese grater, throw it all together in a bowl and then pour it back into your head. I don't know if there were others like me out in the world, though Anubis did often speak of my "brothers". I didn't know what he was talking about though, because I had no brothers or sisters._

_But if there were others like me in the world, I pitied them. No one ever deserved to go through what I had been going through for seven years. The life of a bounty hunter wasn't a pleasant one. Especially if that bounty hunter was forced into doing what she despised. Especially if that bounty hunter still had emotions and feelings. Especially if that bounty hunter was bound by immortal law to always do as she was told lest she pay the consequences._

_That bounty hunter was me._


End file.
